CFP: Mormon History Association Conference 2023 (Rochester, NY)

“BEGINNINGS”

Rochester, New York; June 8-11, 2023

The 58th Annual Conference of the Mormon History Association will be June 8-11, 2023, in Rochester, New York. The 2023 conference theme, “Beginnings” intends to evoke the many beginnings in Mormon history. Those beginnings include Joseph Smith’s first vision and the establishment of the Church of Christ in upstate New York, but also the many other firsts throughout the faith’s subsequent history. As this American religious tradition has grown from a fledgling church to a global movement with multiple expressions, it has attracted followers and critics, nurtured disciples and dissenters, and generated gatherings and schisms. It has, in many respects, begun over and over again.

Change is a key tenet of Mormonism, from its birth in the fires of the revivals of the early nineteenth century to its introduction of new teachings, policies, and organizations as it expanded its reach and extended its influence. Individually and institutionally, the faith and its practitioners have wrestled with the shifting theological, social, and political issues of American and global history, navigating and adapting in response to slavery and abolition, political opposition toward religious practices, the struggle for women’s rights, the emergence of the United States as a global military and political force, and, more recently, the fight for LGBTQ+ rights and growing political polarization around the world.

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Are Visionaries Dangerous to Society?

My thanks to series editors J Stuart and Cristina for their edits and comments on this post.

I haven’t read Under the Banner of Heaven; this post is about responses to the book that I have heard. After reading the book, my sister shared with the family her take on the book’s claim of the dangers of believing in personal revelation (Jana Riess makes the same observation about Krakauer’s claim in her review), and it was at that point that I began formulating what I’d observed from studying the history of Christianity: there’s been a long history of people being very worried about other people claiming revelations. No doubt such claims got Jesus in trouble as they did Socrates. After studying this topic in considerable depth, I’d say the worry of the potential threat of visionaries vastly outstrips the actual damage of such people, and thus it looks to me like Under the Banner of Heaven is a popular manifestation of an ancient claim.

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